EU Commissioner Borrell warns of “full-blown war” and describes situation in West Asia as “critical”

European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell warned that the current “critical” situation in West Asia risks escalating into a “full-blown war” amid renewed tensions between Lebanon and Israel.

He made the remarks in an X-post on Sunday after the Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah avenged the assassination of its commander-in-chief Fuad Shukr on July 30 with a massive drone missile attack on 11 military facilities in the occupied territories.

Israel, meanwhile, claimed it had carried out a pre-emptive strike, but Hezbollah rejected this claim and said the regime had only carried out an airstrike that had not destroyed the resistance group’s rocket launchers.

“The situation in the Middle East has reached a critical level of danger, for the region and beyond,” Borrell said.

He added that he supported Lebanese interim Prime Minister Najib Mikati’s call for “the immediate implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701, in addition to the urgently needed ceasefire in Gaza, to prevent the risk of all-out war.”

UNSCR 1701 is a resolution that ended Israel’s war against Lebanon in 2006 and called on Israeli forces to withdraw behind the UN Blue Line, the de facto border between Lebanon and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

At an emergency meeting of his cabinet on Sunday, Mikati said: “First we must stop Israeli aggression and then implement Resolution 1701.”

He also stressed Beirut’s “support for international efforts that could lead to a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.”

Hezbollah and Israel have been engaged in a deadly exchange of fire since early October, shortly after the regime launched a genocidal war in the Gaza Strip following a surprise operation by the Palestinian resistance group Hamas.

In a televised address on Sunday, Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said his group’s latest operation had been completed “as planned” and had caused “major disruption” in the occupied territories. He added: “We have achieved and exceeded our objectives.”

The main target of the operation was the Glilot base north of Tel Aviv, which houses the Israeli secret service Mossad and military intelligence services such as Unit 8200.

Hezbollah has vowed to continue its retaliatory strikes as long as the usurping regime continues its brutal assault on Gaza, which has so far killed at least 40,405 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injured 93,468 others.